PatW
Contributor
My wife and I went to Virgin Gorda in the BVIs in February,
We went to Virgin Gorda from Orlando by way of Miami, San Juan PR and finally to Virgin Gorda sort of. The sort of was that Air Sunshine, the puddle jumper flight from San Juan to Virgin Gorda no longer lands in Virgin Gorda. Apparently the government of the BVI recently bought the Virgin Gorda airport and decided to not allow commercial service into Virgin Gorda. Rumor has it that the governments wants an economic incentive from Air Sunshine. So we landed on Beef Island which is just off of Tortola and had to take a ferry to Virgin Gorda. If we go again, we are thinking of going by way of Saint Thomas (USVI) and taking the ferry to Virgin Gorda.
We stayed at Mango Bay Resort. It is reasonably priced and very pretty. You have kitchenettes so you can go to Spanish Town and get food at Bucks (a very small supermarket or a very large small market) get food and make meals at your rooms. The grounds are beautiful and very well maintained. It is good to be self reliant there. For meals, you can go out. There are quite a few restaurant on Virgin Gorda.
For people who have $$$ and want pampering, there is Little Dix. Little Dix tends to keep people captive on the resort. My wife and I prefer on mixing more and getting around on our own. I think we would chaff at the "restrictions" at Little Dix. To each their own. But there are a fair number of accomodation options.
Meals and accomodations on Virgin Gorda are not cheap. The restraurants are pretty good. Almost all of them are interesting in one way or the other. The Mine Shaft has its own nightly floor show. They have chickens that come home to roost (just like the expression). They roost at sunset in the tree right off the balcony where your table is. So you can drink your favorite libation and watch the chickens come home to roost. You can go to the Top of the Baths and watch the sunset over the Drake Passage. The Drake Passage is named for Sir Francis Drake who singed the Spaniard's Beard in Cadiz and led the SeaDogs against the Spanish Armada. If you cook your own food, you can knock down the expenses. Bucks offers a limited but viable selection.
Top side, Virgin Gorda is very good. You can climb the local mountain. You can kayak (provided by Mango Bay). You can go down to the Baths. These are large rocks at the sea and are very popular with tourists. Cruise ships bring people to Spanish Harbor by the gross to go to the baths. See them when a cruise ship is not in town (not often).
We dove with Dive BVI in Spanish Town. They are a very good dive operation. All of the dive masters were very good. We dove the Dogs and the Wreck of the Rhone. The dogs were fun. There are sheer rock pinnacles forming canyons and swim throughs that were quite fun and interesting. There was even a cave one could dive in (a very easy cave so no training required). The surge made the cave a bit like a moderate thrill ride. My wife loved it. I had my camera and I did not want to risk banging it on the walls. We saw a fair number of octopus on the Dogs. So that was really fun.
The small fish and the very small critters were good. We saw a couple of turtles. Fishing pressure is quite heavy in the BVIs. It is all a marine park but the locals can fish the heck out of the place and do. We even saw squirrel fish for sail at Bucks. Squirrel fish for crying out loud. My wife saw a grouper on one dive. I bet his number is just about up. Lion fish are moving in. So far the numbers are pretty small. But without any large predators, they could easily have their way with the small fish on the reefs.
I also did a couple of shore dives at Mango Bay. The visibility is OK if it is a calm day. Otherwise, it is not worth doing. There is quite a bit of stuff out there so it is fun to do.
Virgin Gorda is a good place for a non diving spouse. The diving is good but not as good as say: Key Largo, Salt Cay (Turks and Caicos), South Caicos (Turks and Caicos) or Little Cayman.
So for good but not great diving and a very nice and scenic island, Virgin Gordo could be just the ticket.
Pat
We went to Virgin Gorda from Orlando by way of Miami, San Juan PR and finally to Virgin Gorda sort of. The sort of was that Air Sunshine, the puddle jumper flight from San Juan to Virgin Gorda no longer lands in Virgin Gorda. Apparently the government of the BVI recently bought the Virgin Gorda airport and decided to not allow commercial service into Virgin Gorda. Rumor has it that the governments wants an economic incentive from Air Sunshine. So we landed on Beef Island which is just off of Tortola and had to take a ferry to Virgin Gorda. If we go again, we are thinking of going by way of Saint Thomas (USVI) and taking the ferry to Virgin Gorda.
We stayed at Mango Bay Resort. It is reasonably priced and very pretty. You have kitchenettes so you can go to Spanish Town and get food at Bucks (a very small supermarket or a very large small market) get food and make meals at your rooms. The grounds are beautiful and very well maintained. It is good to be self reliant there. For meals, you can go out. There are quite a few restaurant on Virgin Gorda.
For people who have $$$ and want pampering, there is Little Dix. Little Dix tends to keep people captive on the resort. My wife and I prefer on mixing more and getting around on our own. I think we would chaff at the "restrictions" at Little Dix. To each their own. But there are a fair number of accomodation options.
Meals and accomodations on Virgin Gorda are not cheap. The restraurants are pretty good. Almost all of them are interesting in one way or the other. The Mine Shaft has its own nightly floor show. They have chickens that come home to roost (just like the expression). They roost at sunset in the tree right off the balcony where your table is. So you can drink your favorite libation and watch the chickens come home to roost. You can go to the Top of the Baths and watch the sunset over the Drake Passage. The Drake Passage is named for Sir Francis Drake who singed the Spaniard's Beard in Cadiz and led the SeaDogs against the Spanish Armada. If you cook your own food, you can knock down the expenses. Bucks offers a limited but viable selection.
Top side, Virgin Gorda is very good. You can climb the local mountain. You can kayak (provided by Mango Bay). You can go down to the Baths. These are large rocks at the sea and are very popular with tourists. Cruise ships bring people to Spanish Harbor by the gross to go to the baths. See them when a cruise ship is not in town (not often).
We dove with Dive BVI in Spanish Town. They are a very good dive operation. All of the dive masters were very good. We dove the Dogs and the Wreck of the Rhone. The dogs were fun. There are sheer rock pinnacles forming canyons and swim throughs that were quite fun and interesting. There was even a cave one could dive in (a very easy cave so no training required). The surge made the cave a bit like a moderate thrill ride. My wife loved it. I had my camera and I did not want to risk banging it on the walls. We saw a fair number of octopus on the Dogs. So that was really fun.
The small fish and the very small critters were good. We saw a couple of turtles. Fishing pressure is quite heavy in the BVIs. It is all a marine park but the locals can fish the heck out of the place and do. We even saw squirrel fish for sail at Bucks. Squirrel fish for crying out loud. My wife saw a grouper on one dive. I bet his number is just about up. Lion fish are moving in. So far the numbers are pretty small. But without any large predators, they could easily have their way with the small fish on the reefs.
I also did a couple of shore dives at Mango Bay. The visibility is OK if it is a calm day. Otherwise, it is not worth doing. There is quite a bit of stuff out there so it is fun to do.
Virgin Gorda is a good place for a non diving spouse. The diving is good but not as good as say: Key Largo, Salt Cay (Turks and Caicos), South Caicos (Turks and Caicos) or Little Cayman.
So for good but not great diving and a very nice and scenic island, Virgin Gordo could be just the ticket.
Pat
